Pop-up toasters are well known. Conventional pop-up toasters generally have at least one spring-loaded bread tray contained within a housing. The bread tray holds a bread product (e.g., slice of bread, one half of an English muffin, one half of a bagel, etc.) or other similar food product while one or more heating elements apply heat to the bread product, thereby toasting the bread product. The bread tray is movable between an up position and a down position and biased toward the up position. In the up position, the bread product may be inserted into the bread tray. When in the up position, the bread product protrudes at least partially from the top of the toaster.
After the bread product is inserted into the bread tray, a user lowers the bread tray to the down position by way of a lifter knob. The lifter knob is typically external to the housing and affixed to the bread tray by way of a lifter arm and lifter bracket. When the bread tray is lowered to the down position, an electrical circuit is completed which starts a toast cycle and applies power to the heating elements and an electromagnet. The energized electromagnet attracts a metal plate affixed to the lifter bracket, thereby retaining the bread tray in the down position.
When the toast cycle is complete, the electromagnet is de-energized thereby releasing the bread tray. Because the bread tray is biased toward the up position, the bread tray returns to the up position. As the bread tray leaves the down position, the electrical circuit is broken and power is removed from the heating elements. Once in the up position, the now-toasted bread (called toast), which protrudes at least partially from the top of the toaster, may be removed from the toaster.
Once the toast cycle is complete, the heating elements are off, and the toast is at least partially protruding from the toaster, the toast rapidly cools. If the user does not quickly retrieve the toast from the toaster, the toast will cool to a temperature that may be undesirable. Some prior art pop-up toasters feature a keep-warm feature that helps slow the cooling of the toast by either retaining the bread tray in the down position after the toast cycle is complete or returning the bread tray to the down position after a predefined period of time has lapsed. However, the keep-warm feature of these prior art toasters necessitate complex and often costly changes to the structure and function of the above-described conventional pop-up toasters.
It has heretofore not been discovered how to create a toaster that is capable of toasting a bread product and slowing the cooling of the toast after the toast cycle is complete without requiring overly complex and costly changes to the structure and function of a conventional pop-up toaster.
The toaster of the following disclosure accomplishes the above and other objectives and overcomes at least the above-described disadvantages of conventional toaster and methods of toasting.